How Does it Work?

Arnia remote hive monitoring system enables you to monitor the status of your honey bee colonies from any Internet enabled device such as a smartphone, tablet, PC or Mac computer. You can check the state of your hives from the comfort of your home, from the train on your way to work or even when on holiday abroad. The system operation is described below, also see our FAQs

Hive Monitors

Each hive to be monitored is fitted with selected sensors. This includes a hive scale and optional sensors for hive humidity, brood temperature and colony acoustics (flight noise, fanning noise and hive activity). The data recorded is transmitted wirelessly to a Gateway unit n the apiary.

Gateway

One Gateway is required per apiary. It collects data from all hive monitors at the apiary and transmits it to Arnia’s User Interface for analysis and presentation. The Gateway is battery powered and has its own transmission capability. No power or WiFi is required in the apiary.

User Interface

Users log in to a secure account from any internet enabled device to access data on their hives through the Arnia User Interface. No additional software is required. The data is presented with clear, easy to read graphics so you can see at a glance the current situation in your hives. Access to current and historical values enables you to generate graphs for selected periods thus allowing trend observation and comparative analysis of data within a colony as well as between different colonies.

User Interface

Once logged in to the User Interface you will be greeted by the Hive View which shows the current status of each hive you are monitoring:-

Below each hive the signal strength and battery level of each Hive Monitor is displayed. The cluster of bees above each hive reflects that hive’s activity or strength. The readings from sensors are displayed in the appropriate icon on any given hive. Positioned along the top of the hives, the weather bar displays the weather conditions at the apiary. If you have the standard system this will only display the ambient temperature. If you have purchased the Arnia Weather Pack the weather bar will also include icons for rainfall and sunshine.

The icons on each hive display current readings from the Hive Monitors. The icons on the hive will vary depending on what monitoring package you have purchased, but can include:-

You can access historical readings from any of the sensors by simply touching or clicking any of the sensor icons. This opens the relevant graph for that sensor thus allowing trend observation and comparative analysis of data within a colony as well as between different colonies. Below are some sample graphs from hives monitored in Arnia’s apiary.

A slider bar along the bottom of the graph allows you to zoom in on time period that is of interest, this could be the previous 24 hours or several months. This graph shows temperature readings from one hive.

Compare different data from a single hive
Another sensor from the same hive can easily be added to the graph by clicking on the relevant icon for that hive. This graph shows hive temperature, brood temperature and hive humidity for 1 hive. (Note the stable brood temperature and variable hive temperature)

Compare data from different hives
In the same way, a sensor reading from other hives can easily be included on the same graph for comparison. This graph shows hive humidity compared on three different hives. Note one hive is showing higher humidity than the other two.

arnia hive monitors

Can you imagine being able to assess the state of your bee hives using your iphone or laptop from the comfort of the kitchen table while eating your toast in the morning? Or from the other side of the world? Or being able to check that the queen is still OK following an inspection without having to make a return trip to the hives? Sounds incredible?